Blood Bind (Feitan x Reader)

Chapter 27

It took hours before Blair left Anaia's side. Perhaps she thought the threat of you speaking to Anaia was over, or that Anaia would follow and head to bed for the night. But Blair had been wrong, and sorely underestimated how long you were willing to wait. And Anaia knew it too when she gave you a nod halfway through the night to tell you she was waiting for your queue to slip away and speak.

After convincing Feitan to leave you alone for a few minutes, you caught Anaia's eye and headed out back where the sounds of night and joyful hollering from the pool would mask the words you were going to share. It seemed like some of the Troupe was checked out for the night and wanted their leisure time.

You lounged together on the terrace, watching the people around you enjoy themselves. Someone threw a girl with glasses in the pool and when she resurfaced, she couldn't recall who'd been responsible. Uvo wouldn't stop jumping into the deep end and sending waves across the water. And a few others you hadn't met yet were drinking and smoking as they laid out of the grass and watched the stars. But that unrepentant joy didn't feel possible for yourself or Anaia.

"I'm not actually apologizing for putting you in jail," you said as an icebreaker. "Just for keeping you there too long."

And to your surprise, Anaia laughed.

"I'll find a way to lock you up one day and you'll see what it's like," Anaia said. But there was no malice in her voice. "Ignore Blair. She doesn't see what else is going on here."

"She doesn't know about Marco?" you said.

"Or the work I was doing for the Hunter Association about TPI," Anaia said. "But that's her own fault. She chose years ago to stay out of Chrollo's business. This is the result."

It was brave and risky for Anaia to give any more information on what she'd been doing before she crossed paths with Shalnark–another Hunter.

"Don't you think you should tell her?" you said. "She's your friend."

Or you assumed they were friends with the way Blair was behaving. Unless Anaia had come up with some conniving plan to convince Blair that an old casual acquaintance with her was more friendship than anything and warranted her immediate release from Spider jail.

"She was," Anaia said. "In another life."

"Don't say some dumb shit about not having friends," you said, enjoying the idea of bickering with someone as close to family as anyone could come. You didn't know her well, and weren't sure she was interested in knowing you, but there was an understanding there with the singular goal.

"I had friends," Anaia said. "It's easy for people to give you personality traits that compliment their own when you're a cold, blank slate." She shifted and rested her arms over the bannisters towards the moon peeking over the forest and grass swaying in the breeze. "We went to college together, studied the same thing," Anaia said. "But I passed my Hunter exam and immediately disappeared after graduation. Friends, relationships–they're hard. I left and Blair stayed an academic. We should be glad for it since she can translate that ghastly book."

"I'm also a Hunter," you said, trying to convey the caution in your tone. It was a delicate ask. "And I'm not openly affiliated with the Phantom Troupe, at least not yet. I think that gives us an opportunity here with TPI."

Anaia smiled, thin-lipped and contemplative. "I was thinking the same thing."

"We're going back for Marco?"

"Of course we're going back for Marco," Anaia snapped. "You're too smart to ask stupid things like that." You laughed and held yourself back from dragging your old prisoner into a hug she definitely didn't want. "I called my contact at the Hunter Association," Anaia said, turning to face you. She rested their elbow on the bannister and sat back on her hip. "Partially to tell them I was alive, but also to tell them I found us another accomplice." There weren't words to convey the strange uneasiness that came with vocalizing the thought of working with the Hunters. You'd never done it in an official capacity. And was it a conflict of interest to be bound to a Spider and use the Hunter Association resources to help take down TPI? Even if it was, you were going to try. "He wants to meet you. I think with the two of us, we've got a better shot than me alone."